Mitt Romney at Liberty University

An unnecessary speech

THOSE who complain that Mitt Romney's privilege has left him insensitive to the workaday problems of the common man fail to consider that the man has apparently struggled for his whole life with the curse of awful timing. There he was Saturday, just days after Barack Obama was garlanded with praise for his surprise endorsement of gay marriage, giving a commencement address at Jerry Falwell's Liberty University in Lynchburg, Virginia. That must have been about the last place a candidate would want to turn up if he was hoping to gently waffle about his views on social issues, as Mr Romney has been wont to do.

The speech was an effort by Mr Romney, a Mormon, to bolster relations with non-Mormon Christians (or, to be precise, that subset of Christians who represent the "religious right"—as Timothy Noah aptly pointed out in March, the category of "Christian" encompasses nearly 80% of Americans). Polls show that a considerable number of people profess to be leery of voting for a Mormon; the wariness is especially pronounced among self-identified evangelical Christians, a demographic that has heavily favoured Republicans in recent elections.

This is actually the second major address Mr Romney has given on the subject of his religion. In 2007, while campaigning for the Republican nomination, he offered a speech that explicitly referenced John F. Kennedy's 1960 address on his Catholicism. In that speech, Mr Romney, like JFK before him, sought to reassure voters who were worried about electing a president whose religion includes a strong, centralised, earthly authority: "Let me assure you that no authorities of my church, or of any other church for that matter, will ever exert influence on presidential decisions."

The fact that Mr Romney became the nominee this year might be taken as evidence that concern about his religion has faded. This time around, Mr Romney focused on voters who were suspicious of Mormonism's beliefs rather than its governing structure. "People of different faiths, like yours and mine, sometimes wonder where we can meet in common purpose, when there are so many differences in creed and theology," he said. "Surely the answer is that we can meet in service, in shared moral convictions about our nation stemming from a common worldview."

Evangelical leaders applauded the speech. More generally, as Brad Knickerbocker notes at the Christian Science Monitor, Mr Romney's overall outreach effort has been "apparently successful". Sceptical though they may be of a Mormon, there are bigger bogeymen. I think back to Richard Land, the head of the Southern Baptist Convention, chuckling at an appearance at the National Press Club in DC last autumn, explaining that nothing unites evangelicals like Barack Obama. If values voters were going to undo Mr Romney, they were going to do it in the primary.

So Saturday's speech was of questionable necessity, and it could come back to haunt Mr Romney. First, as Ross Douthat noted in the New York Times, this year's social battles—over contraception, over gay marriage—have resulted in a lot of good press for the president, and are probably less salient to moderate voters than the half-hearted recovery. This speech means another round of cultural commentary, rather than a shift to the economy or entitlement reform or any of the issues where Mr Romney might feel more comfortable.

Secondly, this speech, with its vaguely teleological cast—"from the beginning, this nation trusted in God, not man"—sounds like something Rick Santorum would have said. (In fact, Mr Romney gave a polite but passing reference to Mr Santorum in the speech.) Possible etch-a-sketchery aside, the argument in question is a problematic one. That is, Mr Romney, like Mr Santorum before him, is suddenly conflating the "Judeo-Christian tradition" with American culture writ large, which is dubious from a historical perspective as well as, perhaps, a constitutional one. Here's Mr Romney:

Harvard historian David Landes devoted his lifelong study to understanding why some civilizations rise, and why others falter. His conclusion: Culture makes all the difference. Not natural resources, not geography, but what people believe and value. Central to America's rise to global leadership is our Judeo-Christian tradition, with its vision of the goodness and possibilities of every life.

It's not particularly contentious to say that culture matters. And Mr Romney does go on to cite aspects of American culture that most of us would agree with: "personal responsibility, the dignity of work, the value of education, the merit of service, devotion to a purpose greater than self, and, at the foundation, the pre-eminence of the family." Those are laudable values, that is, and American ones, but they're not the intellectual property of Jews and Christians. Nor should a religious voter wish it otherwise, really. As Mr Romney says, the "Christian conscience" can be a force for good, but as he said in 2007, "we separate church and state affairs in this country, and for good reason." After years of struggling with the politics of being a Mormon, Mr Romney has apparently allayed concerns among conservative Christians. But he may have found a new way to aggravate moderates.

I don't understand. Did Judeo-Christians invent all the good values in the world? Am I, a voter-to-be, to understand the only people who work hard and value education and believe in the pre-eminence of the family are Christians (of the Jerry Faldwell brand no less)? Has Mr. Good Christian ever heard of Confucius? Has he ever been outside of America? For that matter, has he ever been outside of a Mormon Church? He sent chills down my spine.

The eminent Harvard professor forgot to think about (I assume this - maybe he wrote about it elsewhere, in which case I apologize in advance for an assumption based on insufficient information). A civilization falls when it becomes complacent. Complacency sets in when what once was strong has become too comfortable for too long. Complacency means taking a self-congratulatory position irrespective whether one has done good or bad. Complacency leads to seeing every which wrong in all others while failing to seeing the exact same in the self, even as the exact same are in the self. Complacency leads to looking at the mirror and seeing what’s in it as “superior” for no other reason than as a matter of a priori fact. The “superiority” says because it is so perfect, it requires no improvement even as all around and outside the borders of the mirror says at least some Windex is in order. This is the cause of the fall of civilization. No Windex. When the people in it fail to see the length of their own horse’s face even as they spend the bulk of their time attacking everyone else for having too long a face.

A complacent country or person holds fast to the unwavering assumption that when they are good, they are better; when they are bad, why, they are not bad at all. “I can do X, you cannot. Because whatever X is, when I do it, I am good. When you do it, you are bad.” This is what complacency says. The effect of complacency is insidious decay and eventual fall of the strong. No country or individual is exempt from the life-threatening effect of complacency, whichever alphabet their names begin with.

Actually we don’t have any disagreement at all except on the definition of terms. If you like, please scrap my term and plug in whatever term you like as long as it reflects the essence of the Windex Syndrome as I explicated. Please excuse the frivolous term. This is a TE blog comment, not a poli-sci treatise.

The context for the use of the frivolous term is the cause of the rise and fall of a civilization, the topic of the instant DiA post by E.G. In my original comment, I conceived of “civilization” as an entity embodied in a nation state and the people who represent and function in that nation state.

Windex Syndrome, to repeat, is the inability to see clearly when the proposed see-er faces a mirror with his eyes and nose pointed at it, while this inability reverts to a full ability the instant the proposed see-er turns his back away from the mirror with its eyes and nose pointed at someone else. This causes, in my considered opinion, the “fall” part of the “rise and fall” of a civilzation over a sustained period of time.

I also highlighted a built-in propensity in the Windex Syndrome to overly praise the self and overly condemn others when the same conduct and behavior, viewed as “good” in the former and “bad” in the latter, is carried out by self as opposed to others. In other words, Windex Syndrome says its carrier is, a priori, superior, whether he is or not.

Again, I did not say who might carry the Windex Syndrome. I made it very clear in my writing any civilization with names from A to Z, any person with any type of classifications (race, gender, class, faith, marital standing, etc., etc., etc., etc.) is an equal-opportunity candidate for that syndrome.

"A close look at comparative world views still favors the Juseo Christian culture as the most favorable to mankind"

Particularly when compared to all of those war-mongering Buddhists with their drone war attacks and dual invasions.

These days, if we're to judge from the Republican party platform, Judeo-Christian values include gun rights, the death penalty, the destruction of organized labor, preemptive war, prohibiting homosexuals from visiting their sick partners in the hospital, and tax cuts for the rich. Straight out of the Sermon on the Mount, ain't that right?

"...personal responsibility, the dignity of work, the value of education, the merit of service, devotion to a purpose greater than self, and, at the foundation, the pre-eminence of the family."

He could just as easily have been talking about Japan. I lived there for over four years and found all of the above very common; I would say more so than I have found in the US, especially the last part.

Japan clearly is NOT founded on Judeo-Christian principles.

The author is correct in saying that these characteristics are most definitely not the exclusive intellectual property of Jews and Christians. But they are also most definintely not the exclusive property of Americans.

It is individuals who define their characteristics and their values, not religions, and not nations.

A close look at comparative world views still favors the Juseo Christian culture as the most favorable to mankind. Mathew Parris, an athiest, wrote a very revealing article in the London Times, December 27 2008', in which he admits that the future of Africa lies in the Christian Missionary effort. His article is a wake up call for those who think that NGO and World Bank funding are the future for emerging nations. Romney is just echoing a very famous early American Jonathon Edwards.

It is odd that when discussing the "moderate vote" in the upcomming election we frequently include anyone not an idealogue on the left or right. Perhaps, the more appropriote convention for the moderates would be the sensibles?